1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the healthcare industry and, more particularly, to the field of healthcare practice cost control and management.
2. Description of Related Art
In the healthcare industry, as illustrated in FIG. 1, physicians generally organize themselves into practice groups 25 and normally subcontract to an insurance network 30. The insurance network 30 is not limited to traditional insurance networks, i.e., Blue Cross Blue Shield, Aetna, United Healthcare, etc., but also includes self insured networks within companies, employers, or other large entities. The insurance network 30 includes a plurality of patients 35 that obtain healthcare services from the plurality of physicians 25 participating in the insurance network 30. The groups of physicians 25 include a plurality of physicians 25 that provide healthcare services to a plurality of patients 35 within a particular geographical area in varying medical fields. The physicians in the healthcare practices 25 are normally compensated a predetermined reimbursement amount by the insurance network 30 for every subscribing patient 35 in the insurance network 30 that is to be treated by the physicians 25.
For example, a physician 25 participating in the insurance network 30 may be reimbursed $80 per month by the insurance network 30 for agreeing to treat a patient 35 in the insurance network 30 and assume the responsibility for a percentage of the ancillary medical costs for that patient 25. As illustrated in FIG. 1, there exists a relationship between the insurance network 30 and the physician practice 25. Likewise, there also exists a relationship between the patients 35 and the insurance network 30, and the patients 35 and the physician practices 25. The physician practice 25 normally receives payment for services directly from the patients 35 or through reimbursements from the insurance network 30. The payment that is received from the patient 35 can be in the form of a co-payment or a partial payment for the healthcare services. In order for the physician practice 25 participating in the insurance network 30 to receive the entire reimbursement from the insurance network 30, i.e., the $80 per month for agreeing to treat each patient 35, the physician practice 25 must comply with preselected requirements set by the insurance network 30. These requirements often fall within varying cost centers, such as pharmaceutical, laboratory, anesthesiology, and radiation costs, for example.
In the pharmaceutical area, for example, a wide variety of prescription medications are developed and manufactured to combat similar illnesses. As illustrated in FIG. 1, prescription medication manufacturers 24 sometimes enter into agreements with the insurance network 30. The prescription medication manufacturers 24 sometimes offer rebates to insurance networks 30 if the physician practice 25 prescribes their medications. The prescription medication manufacturers 24 cannot enter into these types of agreements with the physician practices 25, as it would likely be contrary to public policy. The insurance network 30, in turn may enter into an agreement with a pharmacy network 21, such as a pharmacy benefits management (PBM), for example, to encourage the physician practice 25 in the insurance network 30 to prescribe certain medications. The PBM is compensated a profit on the preferred prescription medications, and a portion of the profits are then passed along to the pharmacy 40. The requirements, or preferences, set by the insurance network 30 regarding pharmaceutical costs, for example, include the types of prescription medications that the physicians may prescribe to their patients.
In some instances, the insurance networks provide incentives to the physician practice 25 for prescribing medications upon which, the insurance network 30 receives discounts from prescription medication manufacturers 24. If the physician practice 25 bears any percentage of medication costs for the patient 35 and prescribes medications which differ from those preferred by the insurance network 30, the incentives may be withheld from the physician practice 25, i.e., the physician practice 25 may be paid nothing instead of $10 for the patient 35 in the insurance network 30. As illustrated in FIG. 1, the insurance network 30 monitors the prescriptions that the physician practice 25 participating in the insurance network 30 writes through a monitoring relationship developed with pharmacies 40 and pharmacy networks 21. In this monitoring relationship, the pharmacy 40 and the PBM provide claims data to the insurance network 30.
There are many different levels of risk for the physician practice 25 that is associated with this arrangement. If the insurance network 30 assumes the financial responsibility for the patient's 35 healthcare needs, then the physician practice 25 assumes no risk. If, however, the physician practice 25 assumes the financial responsibility for the patient's healthcare needs, i.e., any healthcare costs beyond the reimbursement amount from the insurance network 30, then the physician practice 25 assumes the most risk. Another alternative arrangement is if the financial responsibility for the patient's 35 healthcare needs is shared between the physician practice 25 and the insurance network 30. In such an arrangement, the risk for patient's 35 healthcare costs is shared between the insurance network 30 and the physician practice 25. As illustrated in FIG. 1, the payments between the insurance network 30 and the physician practice 25 can vary depending upon the amount of risk taken by the physician practice 25.
As further illustrated in FIG. 1, patients 35 participating in the insurance network 30 obtain healthcare treatment from the physician practice 25 and pay premiums or insurance payments to the insurance network 30. The medical treatment provided to the patients 35 by the physicians in the physician practice 25 can include prescribing medications. The patients 35, however, obtain the prescription medications from the pharmacy 40 and provide either a full payment or a co-payment for the prescription medications. The patient 35 can then be reimbursed for some or all of the payment for the prescription medications from the insurance network 30.
This arrangement is disadvantageous for the physician practice 25 participating in the insurance network 30 because it requires a great deal of management and organization to follow the requirements of the insurance network 30. The system is even more disadvantageous for the physician practice 25 if it participates in multiple insurance networks 30. Each insurance network 30 maintains a preferred list of prescription medications, for example, that the physician practice 25 may prescribe to the patients 35. Further, each insurance network 30 updates their preferred list of prescription medications on a routine basis. The physician practice 25 in the insurance network 30 generally attempts to spend the majority of their time treating patients 35. The management and organization of the insurance network 30 requirements can be time consuming and eliminate some of the time that a physician practice 25 may normally dedicate to the treatment of patients 35.
Traditionally, there also has been tension between the physician practice 25 and the insurance network 30. The tension can be caused by the insurance network 30 delaying payment to the physician practice 25 with notification of a particular network requirement that has been violated, if any. In addition, the physician practice 25 normally receives very little support from the insurance network 30, such as patient history updates and information on medication costs. Tensions are also sometimes caused by the insurance network's 30 perception that the physician practice 25 over-bills for treatment and does not provide all possible treatment options for patients 35. The physician practice 25 sometimes feels pressured by the insurance network 30 to provide medical treatment to their patients 35 according to the preferences of the insurance network 30 instead of according to their own medical judgments. Of course, the physician practice 25 is free to independently treat the patients 35 in the insurance network 30 based on medical judgment, but the tension between the physician practice 25 and the insurance network 30 still exists.
The physician practice 25 is not bound by the treatment procedures that are preferred by the insurance network 30. Often, however, conflict between the insurance network 30 and the physician practice 25 can arise when the insurance network 30 prefers the physician practice 25 to perform certain medical procedures or prescribe particular medications that are more profitable to the insurance network 30. The physician practice 25 does not have the time necessary to perform the exhaustive research necessary to determine if the treatment proposed by the insurance network 30 is feasible, or even safe, to patients 35. Prudent physicians in the physician practice 25 often do not change their treatment practices based simply on information provided by the insurance networks 30.
In the interest of patient safety, physicians in the physician practice 25 should research medical literature to become more educated as to possible benefits of alternative medications. As noted above, however, this takes a great deal of time that can better be used to treat patients 35. In order to conserve the time that might normally be spent on managing and organizing the insurance network 30 requirements, however, some physician practices 35 may hire office managers. This is disadvantageous because an office manager can be extremely costly and will normally need office space. The office space that may be used by the proposed office manager may be an examination room in which the physician would normally treat patients 35. Once again, this cuts down on the number of patients 35 that the physician practice 25 can possibly treat. The office manager also often only manages finances and personnel and has little understanding of physician practices 25 with respect to relationships between insurance networks 30 and physicians' 25 decisions and practices with respect to patients 30.
It has been proposed that the performance of a first healthcare provider can be compared to the performance of a second healthcare provider using a computer program as described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,652,842 titled “Analysis and Reporting of Performance of Service Providers”, by Siegrist, Jr. et al. More particularly, a method of monitoring customer satisfaction so as to keep the healthcare providers competitive in many different fields is described. The method described in Siegrist, Jr. et al., however, is disadvantageous to group physicians in organizing and managing healthcare costs that are dependant upon preferred treatment of the insurance network.
Often times, in an effort to become more profitable, a healthcare practice 25 or a self insured employer may study the current relationship between the healthcare practice group 25 and the insurance network 30 or hire a business consultant to analyze this relationship and make recommendations as to how to become more profitable. This, however, is disadvantageous because the business consultant does not have accountability for the results. In other words, the business consultant analyzes the situation, makes a recommendation, and collects a fee for the time spent in analyzing the situation. This is normally the end of the relationship between the business consultant and the physician 25. The responsibility for implementation is then shifted to the healthcare practice 25, with some added knowledge provided by the business consultant who has collected a fee and exited the situation, to make the practice more profitable with no assistance.
Hiring a business consultant is also disadvantageous because the healthcare practice 25 has to assume risk for engaging the business consultant to review the healthcare practice 25. This is also disadvantageous because prudent physicians will normally take time to evaluate the expertise of the business consultant if the situation calls for the healthcare practice 25 to assume a risk. This is further disadvantageous because the healthcare practice 25 is left with the responsibility of implementing the suggestions of the business consultant in cases where the consultant merely analyzes the situation and provides information.
When the physician practice 25 is not able to organize and manage medical treatment information in a manner that is preferred by the insurance network 30 in which they participate, there only exist two possible results. Either the physician practice 25 receives lower reimbursements from the insurance network 30, or the insurance network 30 is less profitable. No matter which result occurs, however, the ultimate end result is higher medical costs for patients 35. Therefore, the patients 35 are the real losers in the situations described above.